The Supreme Court is allowing nationwide enforcement of a new Trump administration rule that prevents most Central American immigrants from seeking asylum in the United States.The justices' order late Wednesday temporarily undoes a lower-court ruling that had blocked the new asylum policy in some states along the southern border. The policy is meant to deny asylum to anyone who passes through another country on the way to the U.S. without seeking protection in that other country.Most people crossing the southern border are Central Americans fleeing violence and poverty. They are largely ineligible for U.S. asylum under the new rule.The shift reverses decades of U.S. policy. The administration has said that it wants to close the gap between an initial asylum screening that most people pass and a final decision on asylum that most people do not win."BIG United States Supreme Court WIN for the Border on Asylum!" Trump tweeted.Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor dissented from the high court's order. Sotomayor says the rule upends "longstanding practices regarding refugees who seek shelter from persecution."The high-court action leaves the administration free to impose the new policy everywhere while the court case against it continues.Lee Gelernt, the American Civil Liberties Union lawyer who is representing immigrant advocacy groups in the case, said: "This is just a temporary step, and we're hopeful we'll prevail at the end of the day. The lives of thousands of families are at stake."Related video: How asylum works in the U.S.

WASHINGTON —

The Supreme Court is allowing nationwide enforcement of a new Trump administration rule that prevents most Central American immigrants from seeking asylum in the United States.

The justices' order late Wednesday temporarily undoes a lower-court ruling that had blocked the new asylum policy in some states along the southern border. The policy is meant to deny asylum to anyone who passes through another country on the way to the U.S. without seeking protection in that other country.

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Most people crossing the southern border are Central Americans fleeing violence and poverty. They are largely ineligible for U.S. asylum under the new rule.

The shift reverses decades of U.S. policy. The administration has said that it wants to close the gap between an initial asylum screening that most people pass and a final decision on asylum that most people do not win.

"BIG United States Supreme Court WIN for the Border on Asylum!" Trump tweeted.

The high-court action leaves the administration free to impose the new policy everywhere while the court case against it continues.

Lee Gelernt, the American Civil Liberties Union lawyer who is representing immigrant advocacy groups in the case, said: "This is just a temporary step, and we're hopeful we'll prevail at the end of the day. The lives of thousands of families are at stake."